Tuesday, December 1, 2015

devil in disguise as a fair woman

"because, though you have lost yesterday, He has not."
--C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

I'm so sorry for you.
I wish that I could erase all your guilt
I wish that I could erase all your self-loathing
and your pain.
I have the power to create,
yet have not the power to expunge.
What is written, not a jot will be undone.

If I were a man,
I could--one day--absolve you of your sins,
as you so have me of mine.
I wish it were as simple
as a tender: I forgive you
or a gentle: but I know you.
But that tree of knowledge has always been our downfall
and true pardon remains within subjunctive clauses.
once poisoned by the knowledge of good and evil,
our mouths are smarting from its tart juice.
Our hands are stained from grasping for its low-hanging fruit,
our consciences smarting from the smacking from its low-hanging boughs.

She spoke too soon,
she lost some face,
but inspired a movement
of falling grace.
She was the fair woman,
the devil in disguise was me.

A woman stole the 'f' key off my keyboard. It happened while I was waiting for the bathroom, three people ahead of me in line. O...

About me

"I never want to lose the story-loving child within me, or the adolescent, or the young woman, or the middle-aged one, because all together they help me to be fully alive on this journey, and show me that I must be willing to go where it takes me, even through the valley of the shadow."--Madeleine L'Engle